Darren Hernandez pulled himself up onto a barstool and tried not to wince as his knee twisted. The damn thing was just about useless. Of course, it had been that way for years, and it hadn’t stopped him yet. Yet. No doubt those x-rays he’d just had done at the orthopedics office would tell a tale that he would rather not hear. There was nothing like some guy in a white lab jacket telling you that everything you’d done in your life so far was about to cash in on your health like an overripe bar tab.

Somehow, turning twenty-six felt like eighty. His body was tired, and he was ready to—actually, he had no freaking clue what he was ready for. At this moment, he just wished his brother Laredo would show up. How very like Laredo to leave Darren sitting here like some loser after last call. It was probably meant to be a humbling moment.

“Hey, little brother.” Laredo appeared at Darren’s side as though he had heard every thought in Darren’s head. “You look tired. You want a drink? I’m buying.”

“Oh, well, if my rich big brother is buying, then hell yeah I’m drinking,” Darren said sarcastically. He raised his hand and snapped at the bartender. “Let’s get another round of beers over here! Big bro is buying!”

Laredo frowned. “Are you drunk already?”

“No,” Laredo snorted.

No. Darren wasn’t drunk, and he wasn’t high on painkillers either. That was a real switch that goody two-shoes Laredo probably could not even fathom. The only thing Darren and Laredo had in common was their looks. Both men shared the Hernandez features. They had the dark wavy hair and the athletic build on a six-foot-tall frame. All five of the Hernandez brothers had their mother’s blue eyes. It was a striking combination, the olive skin and blue eyes. At least that’s what women tended to tell Darren between the bar and the bedroom.

That was where any similarities ended. Darren traveled around wherever he could find a football contract. Laredo had been in Denver for years. The guy lived a charmed life. He had a beautiful home, a lucrative position with their family’s land and cattle company, and a beautiful daughter, and Laredo was the apple of their father’s eye. Yeah. Laredo had no clue just how good he had it.

“What’s wrong with you?” Laredo shook his head as the bartender set big pint glasses of beer in front of them. “How long have you been back in Denver anyway? Dad was thrilled to hear from you. He thinks you walk on water. It’s pathetic actually.”

Of course, this last bit was muttered as though Laredo found this annoying in the extreme. Darren could only imagine how irritating it was for Laredo to share their father’s love. Since there were five—no—six of them, there wasn’t that much love and affection to go around. Joe Hernandez didn’t believe in coddling his children. He barely believed in loving them. He only believed in what they could do for him, and that was pretty much where it stopped.

“Dad always was a bit on the pathetic side,” Darren snorted. “But that’s not why we’re here. Why are we here, actually? And why are you twenty minutes late?”

“I had to meet with Jesse.”

Darren raised his eyebrows. “Our foster sister Jesse?”

“Adopted, actually, but yes.”

Obviously this had not been a very pleasant meeting. Darren had never found Jesse to be difficult to get along with. He couldn’t imagine why Laredo seemed so grim about it. Finally, Darren gave up and twirled his hand in a little circle. “Are you going to explain why it seems like you didn’t enjoy your meeting with Jesse?”

“She just turned twenty-one.”

Darren was at a loss. Jesse had never seemed the partying type. In fact, she had always been a little more serious than Darren could deal with. Since her parents’ deaths when Jesse was eleven, she had lived with the Hernandez clan because that’s what her father’s will had specified for guardianship. Darren had never been all that clear as to why Jesse hadn’t been shipped off to a relative, but that wasn’t his problem. One eleven-year-old hadn’t taken up much space, and Darren had left home on a football scholarship to the University of Colorado Denver before Jesse had even turned sixteen.

“Sorry, bro,” Darren said, spreading his hands and looking about as apologetic as he felt, which wasn’t at all. “I still don’t get it. Jesse was always a good kid. I’m sure that hasn’t changed.”

Laredo pursed his lips. “At twenty-one she gains control of the land that’s been held in trust for her. You know, her family’s ranch?”

Darren still didn’t get why this was a problem for Laredo. Shouldn’t they be glad that Jesse was old enough to run her own shit and be a grown-up? Everyone was forever nagging Darren to grow up and start supporting himself. It sounded like Jesse was getting around to that a hell of a lot sooner than Darren had managed to do.

“That’s a hundred thousand acres of land,” Laredo said slowly. He took a long drink of his beer. “Plus, there are a lot of grazing leases that the Collins ranch holds.”

Darren felt a bell going off in his head. Business. This was all about business. “Jesse is basically our sister, Laredo.” Darren cleared his throat. He really hoped that his brother wasn’t as big of an ass as he was beginning to sound like. “It’s Jesse’s turn to run her own ranch. Just because we’ve been doing it since her parents died doesn’t mean that she has to leave that to us now.”

“Tell that to Dad,” Laredo said darkly. “I was more or less ordered to get Jesse to sign over the running of things for another year. Dad is hoping that by then Jesse will decide to either sign over lease rights to us permanently, or to let us have the land.”

“Have it?” Darren whistled. “You’ve got to be kidding me. That has to be millions of dollars’ worth of land.”

“Something like that.” Laredo shrugged it off. “Not that you know anything about that.”

“I’m here to learn,” Darren shot back. “Dad says you’re going to teach me how to run the business.”

“Run it?” Laredo threw his head back and laughed. “Oh no, no, little brother. You’re not going to run it. People are still somewhat impressed with your football career. You did have one season on the last string of a pro team, you know.”

“I remember.” Darren would have rather forgotten, but that’s how it went. You only forgot the stuff you wanted to remember, and you remembered the things you would have been better off forgetting.

“So, you’re about to be our schmoozer.”

“Schmoozer?” Darren’s brain actually stopped for a moment. “Meaning what? I just show up places and smile pretty for the camera?”

“You’re going to encourage everyone you meet at social events and other business meetings to use Hernandez Land & Cattle for their stock contracting needs. Then you’re going to smile pretty and sell some real estate.”

“I don’t know a damn thing about real estate,” Darren muttered.

Was Laredo insane? How was Darren supposed to do any of this stuff? It felt like he was getting set up to fail. Big time. Just because he was a Hernandez did not mean that he had been born automatically knowing how to breed a good bucking horse, rope a steer, or put together a land deal.

“I’m fully aware that you’re not the man for this job,” Laredo said drily. “But you are very likeable in general. And at this point we need to use that to smooth out some rough edges.”

“Rough edges?”

“Do you remember Clouds End Farm?”

Darren sighed. Why did everyone always assume he was stupid? “Of course. Aria Callahan was Jesse’s best friend in school.”

“So, Jesse does business with Aria.” Laredo seemed to have a tough time talking about Aria. Weird. Laredo took a sip of his drink and pressed his lips together. “Aria has been saying that she’s not going to do business with us anymore because she doesn’t approve of how we’ve been dealing with Jesse during the changeover.”

“Sounds reasonable,” Darren muttered. He was really tired of this bullshit already. Was he really going to make a career out of this?

“So, you’re going to go talk to Aria and smooth things over.” Laredo made it sound like Darren was being given a monumental and rather impossible task.

Darren leaned back in his barstool and took another long drink of his beer. It was entirely possible that the smile on Laredo’s face was at least partly motivated by revenge. Or something along those lines. The guy could certainly hold a grudge, and Laredo and Darren hadn’t been exactly close growing up. Other than in age. Darren, Laredo, and their oldest brother, Calvin, were all stair steps. They were barely twelve months apart. Sometimes Darren wondered what their mother had been thinking having five boys in seven years.

“Because you aren’t the kind of guy we usually like around our regular corporate activities,” Laredo continued, “you will be discovering that showing up to the office every day may be the most work you have to do. Then there will be the regular list of errands I’ll need you to complete too.”

“Errands?” Darren leaned back in his seat and finished off his beer before raising his hand to signal for another one. If Laredo was not only buying the drinks but making Darren his errand boy, Darren needed more beer to deal with this latest bullshit turn of events in his life. “What kind of errands?”

“My daughter, Bella, goes to a private school.”

“Okay?” Darren wasn’t exactly surprised. Denver Public was generally considered a great public school district, but Laredo wasn’t that kind of guy. “You’ll have to explain to me what that means.”

“It means that since Bella’s no-good whore of a mother ran off with one of our ranch hands about five years ago, I’m parenting all by myself.”

“At least Bella is a great kid.” Darren would not lie. Not even to himself. There was a bit of satisfaction in knowing that Laredo’s love life was in the toilet even though he seemed to have the rest of it together.

“Bella is a great kid,” Laredo agreed. “But sometimes it’s really hard for me to pick her up at the end of every school day. I can take her in the mornings on my way in, but the afternoons are problematic. Then sometimes she has dance or other activities to get to.”

Darren was pretty sure this was not what their father had in mind when he told Darren that he would be learning the family business from Laredo. However, since Darren didn’t really want to schmooze, sell real estate, or be a cattle pusher—so to speak—this was a better alternative anyway.

“Fine.” Darren picked up the fresh beer and downed half the contents in one pull. “You give me a paycheck and I’ll take your kid to dance class.”

Laredo frowned. He had finished his beer and was very carefully not touching the second one that the bartender had dropped by along with Darren’s second, or third. He had lost track. Since Laredo obviously wasn’t going to drink it, Darren reached for the beer and downed a good portion of that too.

“Where are you staying?” Laredo wanted to know.

“I got here yesterday.” Darren shrugged. “I crashed at Mom and Dad’s.”

Laredo gave a derisive snort. “That’s not going to last.”

“It’ll last until I get enough cash to pay for a place.” Darren shrugged. He didn’t really care. His parents were his parents. That meant in his book they were forced by parental duty to put up with him for at least six months.

“I think we have some vacancies in one of our apartment buildings here in the city.” Laredo sounded almost grudging. “I’ll look into it. Maybe we can figure something out as long as you’re not throwing wild parties and acting like a lunatic while you trash the place.”

“I’m insulted,” Darren snorted. He wasn’t. Not really. It was probably a valid concern on Laredo’s part. Darren did have quite a history of wild behavior. “I’ve calmed down some in my old age, big brother. I’m damn near boring now.”

“Yeah, I can really tell.” Laredo looked pointedly at the bevy of empty pint glasses in front of Darren. “Just make sure you show up at the office tomorrow morning at nine o’clock.”

“Damn. That’s early!” Darren was sort of joking about the time, but he did have another problem. “And could you text me the address?”

“The address?” Laredo was gaping. “You don’t know where our corporate offices are located?”

“Have I ever been there?” Darren pointed out.

“Fair enough.” Laredo sighed. Then he pulled out his phone and sent off a text.

Darren received the text and pulled out his phone. Damn. He had three missed texts from Carly. That was never a good sign. A quick look at the screen showed him that Carly had somehow found out that Darren was back in Denver. That sounded like a bad film title, and honestly, where Carly was concerned, it might as well have been.

“You okay?” Laredo was giving Darren that sideways look of something approaching concern.

“Yeah. Fine. I’ll be there tomorrow first thing.”

“All right.” Laredo got up from his seat. “I have to get home so the housekeeper can leave for the night.”

“Kids,” Darren said, only half joking. “They really change your life. Huh?”

Laredo narrowed his gaze and stared long and hard at Darren. “Yeah. They really do.”

No truer statement had ever been spoken.